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Wednesday, November 14, 2012

A PostNatal Yogi Wannabe

There are so many different flavours of yoga- and interestingly for the most part they are all open for the trying. In fact, unless you're an ashtangi, it's considered bad yoga form to judge a style without first trying it out.

Of course, following that was what got me in the "hot yoga" mess, which led me to the conclusion that, well, hot yoga is crappy for the environment. Considered it judged.

One style of yoga that definitely has it's own "club" is pre-post natal. You can't really fake your way into that one (without being a total d-bag).

My first pre-natal yoga class was about three years ago... in my living room with YogaGlo. Look, I can explain: my favourite YogaGlo teacher had stopped posting classes and the only options left were her prenatal classes. I glanced surreptitiously around my living room, as if the Prenatal Yoga Police were going to come rushing out waving their "SHAME ON YOU" signs, took an embarrassed breath, prepared mentally to laugh my entire way through and.... LOVED it.

Yep, that was an amazing, fantabulous class.

Weird.

Fast forward to the past few months and another of my favourite YogaGlo teachers is going on a pre/post natal class spree. So... as one cat judged me quietly from Andrew's chair and the other blindly attacked my legs, I prepared myself to be weirdly happy during a class meant for new mothers.

(Asteya, the true ruler of this apartment, sitting on her throne as her lowly human servant Andrew checks his facebook)

It's not like I would actually have the gall to attend an in-studio pre/post natal yoga class. A) they wouldn't allow me to B) if I lied I would be a total d-bag and C) that would be way beyond disrespectful for all the new/expectant mothers to be (which is actually the main deterrent, I have much respect for mothers).

But I can enjoy them, like a weird guilty pleasure, from the comfort of my own living room. And recently, with my friend who has reached awesome new mother status, I can totally legitimately enjoy post natal yoga classes... (yes, I recognize this is getting a bit creepy...)

I guess the message, really, is that yoga is yoga. Target audience not withstanding, if the teacher is great, the class with be great.

5 comments:

i've gone to a few pre-natal classes with my sister when she was pregnant, and now she goes with her sister-in-law who is expecting (my sister delivered 8 months ago). We did have one person comment how cool it was that we were both pregnant at the same time, so i just explained my purpose was to support her and that i wasn't pregnant myself. No one seemed offended! I also viewed it as educational!

Lisa, now I'm curious- what are some of your favourite yogaglo instructors? I got a membership about a year ago, after reading you talk about it, and I LOVE it! Have you noticed that Seane Corn has a couple free classes on there now?

I don't know if I have any guilty yoga pleasures. but one silly thing that I do is giggle at myself when I'm doing a class and the instructor decides to do a posture that is way beyond my ability. This is great for me because I am a pretty harsh judge of myself- so happily laughing at my limitations does not happen often- now this is by myself in my living room, it may be a bit harder surrounded by others...

I took my first pre-natal class when my instructor was getting his certification. I felt bad for him because I was the only one who showed up, but it was very interesting. It must have been odd for him to be the only dude in his training class, but he wore the pregnancy suit and everyone got a huge kick out of it! I learned a lot during my pre-/post-natal teacher training module. It made me feel a little mental to have to shove a pillow under my shirt and pretend to be pregnant while dealing with infertility, but I'm glad I did it. I was able to help my cousin relax during her pregnancy, and so many pre-natal asanas and modifications can be just as helpful in "regular" classes.

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About Me

I have been a passionate ecoholic, yogini and feminist for several years. Although unbendy and more than a little wobbly, my journey with yoga continues to flourish allowing me to grow!
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